So I'm trying to complete the Halflings Ho quest. It was easy enough with a Sorcerer, but a Wizard? Wizards already don't have it great going into this, and compounding that with a race that has exactly zero synergy with them? Gaaah.

Was that quest the one in Grim's Grotto? The problem is that there is nothing special about this particular level - it's just very hard. Which makes it difficult to give specific advice or tricks. Also as you said there is nearly no synergy between halflings and wizards*. I think the most persistent way is to maximise the halflings' racial ability and go for a melee build up:

- tri-sword- extra gold for moar weapons! (extra conversion also equal extra regen)- scout altar- swap mana for health - shield (usually better for the very early levels than sword)- scout shops may actually be useful here since you want to find some melee gear ASAP

The swap is kind of a small synergy for halfling wizards. Glyph conversion mana (should make up a huge part of overall mana in the boss fight) doesn't scale with max mana, but potions scale with health. Also you can throw 2 fireballs from the start and won't be able to throw 3 with or without boosters.

Do the altar scouting first and look for nice items and glyphs on the way. Choose one glyph for fights and only pick up other ones if you really need them.Item choices slightly depend on the boss. Unless the boss is undead, poison strike is always very good for boss fights. In order to utilize your potions you want to get most number of strikes per potion and/or make those strikes count so go for damage increase (preferably %-based) and damage absorption (lifesteal/resistances/raw health). Potions, consumables and fireball enhancers aren't worth as much. Don't pick them unless you know there won't be anything better anymore.

A similar train of thought goes for the god choices.Tikki Tooki: Tikki Tooki is very useful for tri-sword halflings, since you get fast levels and double strike is relatively cheap since you have got a lot of health potions. Also poison is extra useful with a 2 mana let-me-see and will also make TT an option, which isn't too expensive in terms of piety at the final confrontation.Taurog: Whether or not and how much you want to worship taurog depends on your preferred glyph and how often you'll be able to cast it. He is a good choice for the final fight since some casts aren't too piety expensive and you'll still be able to cast most spells with 7 or 9 mana. Boots and resistances are usually the first things to go for.Binlor also isn't too shabby at all. He again is cheap at the boss fight and it is slightly easier to build up your peitey with a wizard. Knockback doesn't care about your -25% damage, but goes well with your tri-sword. Stoneskin gives you a bigger effective health pool, but is a bit costly - usually 20hp for 10 piety is better.GG and Dracul are genereally useful, but get a special prize for being racist towards halflings. You don't want wo worship them once you start using your potions. If you can - worship them and switch later on. Else leave them alone. Converting potions for piety isn't usually worth it, but may help you get unstuck.MA has little use in this strategy, besides glyph magnet, which allows for planning ahead, and being a piety battery in general.

That's not the only way, but i think it's a persistent way and also relatively easy to execute. Some of the above tactics are generally useful and you may know them anyways. I just wrote down the essentials for melee halflings. Further min-maxing may help as well.

Mystera is actually an interesting option, if you can get to altar early - get 100 piety with her from exploration mana regen (lemmisi makes it very non-tedious, bludtopowa very effective, but it still works with just fireball), finish map exploration (excess piety can go to other boons, but be careful since there won't be too much left), then nuke everything with mana leak, finish the strongest monsters you can to get more levels, and deal with the boss.

Mana burn immunity, precasted first strike or death protection help to save a potion after mana leak, fire heart can help knock down one high level monster if you focus on it during exploration.

Halfling Wizards do have one very potent strategy for Glowing Guardian, provided you have HALPMEH and at least one enemy that can poison you (but not manaburn you). Attack that enemy, get poisoned, cast HALPMEH, repeat until either you or the enemy will die from the next blow and then go regenerate (or attack a second enemy with poison, if possible). At 2 piety every 2 mana spent, it's one of the most efficient sources of piety in the game. Get to 100 piety, take Enlightenment (devastatingly powerful at low levels) and then start racking up high level kills. You may want to skip Humility, since Wizards in particular suffer from the reduced HALPMEH and fireball effectiveness, and what you really want is to take Absolution at as high a level as possible. Chain as many high level kills as you can, then once you start to lose your momentum, take Absolution and switch to a deity that won't punish potion consumption as soon as you have 50+ piety. The combination of low level Enlightenment and high level Absolution will give you fairly absurd max HP, which will make your health potions incredibly strong, with extra damage and resistances to top it all off.

Dunno wrote:Mystera is actually an interesting option, if you can get to altar early - get 100 piety with her from exploration mana regen (lemmisi makes it very non-tedious, bludtopowa very effective, but it still works with just fireball), finish map exploration (excess piety can go to other boons, but be careful since there won't be too much left), then nuke everything with mana leak, finish the strongest monsters you can to get more levels, and deal with the boss.

Mana burn immunity, precasted first strike or death protection help to save a potion after mana leak, fire heart can help knock down one high level monster if you focus on it during exploration.